HTC is going heavy metal with its first entry into the smartwatch market in the shape of a watch that retains many of the metallic features of its successful One M8 smartphone that was released earlier this year.

An image leaked by @evleaks shows that the latest addition to the Android Wear family has a square screen encased in metal as well as a strap made from the same material that looks like a normal wrist-watch.

The image shows a Sense UI skinned version of Android Wear that, although it has been altered for Evleaks’ benefit, is close to what the final version of the watch-face will look like.

In terms of the special features that HTC’s attempt at cracking the smartwatch market will include there was no new information and the only other details from a source is that the image “is a 100 per cent faithful reproduction” of the model currently being manufactured by HTC.

Google first announced Android Wear back in March and ever since then there has been a slow trickle of smartwatch announcements from the likes of Motorola, Samsung and LG with HTC’s arrival a long-awaited one.

Android Wear is married closely to its Google Now service and critics are already rounding on the devices due to the potential for an annoying overlap with smartphones and battery life that doesn’t last any longer than a day.

LG’s G Watch and the Samsung Gear Live are both already on sale in the UK and in that sense HTC is lagging behind in the wearables sector with the device’s features likely to dictate how well it ends up selling.

One company that HTC has beaten to the punch is Apple, which has still yet to make a definitive decision on a smartwatch despite the veritable banquet of rumours that continue to dominate the pages of tech websites across the globe.